Gasoline prices might keep falling

Updated 8:05 pm, Thursday, August 15, 2013

The price of gasoline has dropped 8 cents in the last month and might fall more as September historically has brought a decline in gas prices with the end of the summer driving season.

The price of gasoline has dropped 8 cents in the last month and might fall more as September historically has brought a decline in gas prices with the end of the summer driving season.

Photo: John Davenport / San Antonio Express-News

Gasoline prices might keep falling

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Drivers who hit the road over the Labor Day holiday will enjoy a flashback when they pull up to the pump. Prices in Texas and San Antonio are expected to be the lowest since 2010, experts say.

The price of a gallon of regular unleaded gas in San Antonio has dropped 8 cents in the last month to $3.39 a gallon, and the cost of gas is expected to continue to decline this year.

Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst at GasBuddy.com, which tracks prices, expects that prices in Texas and along much of the Gulf Coast to drop to $3 a gallon by year's end. That's a repeat of last year, when gas hit a 12-month low of $3.01 a gallon on Dec. 19 in San Antonio, according to GasBuddy.

Falling gas prices this fall “would be great. It would make a big difference,” said Ray Ruiz, who said he slashed spending on groceries — sometimes even eliminating small treats like ice cream — because of high gas prices. He also took the bus to work at his job at a downtown hotel rather than gas up his V-8 pickup.

Student Denise Riojas said she started walking to San Antonio College about once a week to save on gas, while fellow student Diku Sherpa said cheaper prices would mean she could fill up her vehicle rather than buy a smaller quantity of gas, which has been her practice.

September historically has brought a decline in gas prices with the end of the summer driving season.

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“People will drive less after Labor Day — considerably less,” Kloza said.

In addition, by mid-September many refiners will be able to switch to winter-grade gasoline, which is less expensive to make.

It helps, too, that refiners have ramped up production of gasoline in the wake of a number of outages this summer.

This summer “we had strong demand while some refineries were out of service,” said Brian Milne, energy editor at Schneider Electric, an energy management company. That helped keep prices high, he said.

“We have a good amount of available supply at the ready as we're coming out of the peak driving season. And the factors that this summer kept prices higher are disappearing or gone,” Milne said.

Kloza's prediction of lower gas prices holds, he said, unless violence escalates in the Middle East and chokes off oil supplies. Also, AAA said in a statement that gas prices could spike “if there are late-summer hurricanes that cause refinery problems and disrupt production, distribution or gas supply.”

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“The season has already produced four named storms, with the peak of the season — mid-August through October — yet to come,” the agency said.

The hurricane season ends Nov. 30. Longer term, drivers could see more moderation in gas prices. The Energy Information Administration, the Energy Department's statistical arm, estimates that U.S. gas prices will average $3.37 a gallon in 2014, 15 cents a gallon less than the agency's 2013 estimate of $3.52 a gallon.